Professional Women Found More Likely To Benefit From Employer Child Care

Although employers have taken more steps in recent years to help
their workers arrange child care, professional women are considerably
more likely to benefit from such efforts than are those in
nonprofessional jobs, a new study shows.

The report was published by the Employee Benefit Research Institute,
a nonprofit research group based in Washington. Drawing on data from
the 1990 National Child Care Survey, the study analyzed data on 2,608
working women in households with children under 13.

Flexible-spending accounts allow workers to set aside a portion of
their paychecks, before taxes, that can be drawn on at agreed-upon
intervals to cover dependent care.

Among women in the study, 14.3 percent received at least one type of
child-care benefit--a higher proportion than past studies have found.
But, the study indicates, an inordinate share of the benefits went to
women in professional jobs.

According to the study, 35 percent of women earning more than $20
per hour were offered at least one type of child-care benefit, compared
with 16 percent of those earning less than $5 per hour. Nearly 40
percent of women in professional positions were offered at least one
child-care benefit, compared with 11 percent of women in service jobs,
15 percent of those in production jobs, and virtually none of the women
in agricultural jobs.

Women who completed high school were three times as likely as those
with less education to be offered child-care benefits. The study also
found that women in Western states and in urban and suburban areas were
more likely to be offered benefits than were women in other regions or
in rural areas.

More On-Site Care

Jill Foley, a research analyst for the institute and a co-author of
the report, said the distribution of benefits by profession mirrors the
findings of other studies showing that higher-paid workers in certain
occupations are more apt to receive health insurance, pensions, and
other benefits.

One of the more "surprising findings,'' Ms. Foley noted, was that
nearly 11 percent of all the women in the study were offered on-site
child care. Because of its cost, she noted, on-site care is usually
characterized in other studies as one of the "least-offered
benefits.''

On-site care may have been "more broadly defined'' in the
institute's study, noted Beth Miller, the report's principal author.
The fact that the study surveyed women with children rather than
surveying employers, she added, could also explain the discrepancy.

The higher figure in the study suggests these women "might choose
one job over another because of on-site care,'' noted Ms. Miller, a
research associate with the Family and Children's Policy Center at
Brandeis University.

The study also found that women in occupations such as child care
and teaching were among the most likely to have access to on-site care.
Among other fields, the military and health care had the highest
percentages of women offered on-site child care.

The report, which also examined work options provided by employers,
shows that nearly 30 percent of the mothers could choose to take upaid
leave, and slightly more than 20 percent could choose "flextime.''

Mothers in professional positions, again, were most likely to be
offered such benefits.

Some options the report offers for distributing child-care benefits
more evenly include providing employers with tax incentives only for
benefits targeted at lower-income workers and mandating that employers
offer child-care benefits.

Copies of EBRI Issue Brief 130, "The Distribution of Family Oriented
Benefits,'' are available for $25 each from EBRI Publications, Box
4866, Hampden Station, Baltimore, Md. 21211; (410) 516-6946.

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